Fireworks
by Cyberwolf
Summary: genfic, linked drabbles, fluff, naruhanabi. Yes, that's not a typo. "Naruto's always loved fireworks."
1. secret sun

Naruto's always loved fireworks.

One of his first memories – perhaps his first fully happy memory – is of fireworks, exploding bright and glorious against the night-sky. He has clambered to his window to watch, pressing his chubby little face and hands flat against the grubby glass. It was a festival, yet another thing that he was not allowed to join; he could not mingle with the crowd, he could not taste the foods hawked from the roadside kiosks, he could not run and laugh with the other children.

But he could watch the fireworks.

That was something they could never take away from him, something they _had_ to share with him: they could not stop him from watching the sky.

* * *

_i'm wandering down,  
and searching down the secret sun_

- .hack/sign


	2. where my yearnings were born

They had fireworks on his birthday.

Naruto watched them with hungry eyes, no dirty glass in between him and the fireworks this time; he'd sneaked out of the apartment. He couldn't go to the festival but he could bound around in the emptied streets, hearing the distant babble of the happy crowds and sometimes catching a whiff of delicious scents. He could not join in the games but dodging his jounin caretakers could very nearly be one.

(Of all the festivals, this one was when everyone's eyes on him were cruelest.)

When dusk began to fall he clambered up to an advantageous rooftop and lay there, staring at the sky. His chest heaved with the exertion of fleeing his exasperated caretakers; his clothes were soaked with sweat. A cool breeze whirled about him and he shivered.

His eyes glittered when the fireworks began. As an orange starburst flared against the darkness, lighting up everything for a moment like a million fleeting pieces of the sun, Naruto pretended the fireworks were for him.

* * *

_take me back to the land  
where my yearnings were born_

_-_.hack/sign


	3. a summer night

He ran so fast that the world blurred around him; sweat dripped into his eyes, making them sting. He didn't dare look behind, but he knew that his jounin caretaker was _right_ behind him, ready to grab him and pull him back to his dirty, dark little apartment, to keep him away from the fireworks that would shortly be exploding into the sky…

_He wouldn't let him._

Naruto skidded to a stop, his smaller mass allowing him a quicker halt than the jounin. The man hurtled right past him, cursing as he saw the yellow hair of his mischievous charge go by. Naruto was wheeling as he skidded, wrenching into an ankle-breaker 180-degree turn. He shot off in the opposite direction, his still-trying-to-stop caretaker left far behind in a matter of seconds.

He dashed through the empty streets, fighting back the happy howl that bubbled up in his throat. It wasn't that he was scared to make noise – it was just that he'd need all his air to keep up this speed. He twitched as he heard the quick angry tromp-tromp-tromp that meant his caretaker was back on his trail. Naruto's mind kicked into an even higher buzz of activity as he glanced around himself frantically, trying to plot out an escape route.

He was nearly at the edge of the village, and one side of the street bordered a stretch of semi-forested land. The other side was all one long blank wall, smooth and featureless as an eggshell. Naruto had often hidden in the forests around Konoha, having a strange inner woods-sense that made him quite at ease in the wild. Once he got into the protective cover of the woods, the jounin could count on several hours of hard searching before they could get their hands on the boy – and usually that was because he had gotten hungry for ramen and come back to the city.

_So_, today he chose to leap the wall.

He swerved and took a short running start before leaping up to the top of the wall – an unremarkable feat for a boy used to fleeing jounin over Konoha's rooftops. He crouched for a short moment, regaining his balance; then he jumped into the wide-spread branches of a cherry tree standing several feet away.

He landed so softly he hardly made a rustle, perching on a wooden branch as easily as any woodland creature. He watched as the jounin came into view, and ran immediately for the woods.

_Hah!_

He was so pleased with his succesful ploy that he laughed aloud. And then nearly fell out of the tree as a young voice pierced the air:

"Why are you here?"

Naruto jerked around, catching himself with one hand as he stared down at a small girl who was, in turn, staring up at him. Naruto's sudden motion had caused a cascade of pale pink sakura blossoms, floating softly downward through the air. The two children peered at each other through a curtain of falling petals.

Blue eyes locked with silver.

Several answers raced through his mind. '_They're chasing me' _or '_Well, they wouldn't think to look for me here…where** is** here…?' _or '_Well, I was lost on the road of life…'_ flashed through his quicksilver mind, but in the end he only said the truth.

"I…I wanted to watch the fireworks…"

As if on cue, bursts of light erupted in the sky. Both children fell silent as they tilted their heads upwards, watching the fireworks. The last of the sakura blossoms fell softly to the floor.

"…That's my name," she said, pointing at the sky.

Naruto stared.

"I'm Hanabi. My name is Hanabi."

Naruto couldn't think of a nicer name.

* * *

_come with me  
in the twilight  
of a summer night  
_

-.hack/sign


End file.
